Children's Comprehension Problems in Oral and Written Language

Kate Cain, DPhil, is a Reader in the Department of Psychology at Lancaster University. Her research and publications focus on the development of language comprehension in children, with a particular interest in the skill deficits that lead to comprehension problems. Dr. Cain’s recent journal articles report investigations into the relations that exist between children’s reading comprehension and their inference-making skill, knowledge of narrative structure, interpretation of figurative language, vocabulary-learning mechanisms, and memory processes. She is an Associate Editor of the International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders and the Journal of Research in Reading.

Jane Oakhill, DPhil, is a Professor of Experimental Psychology at the University of Sussex. Since completing her doctorate on the topic of children’s problems in reading comprehension, she has worked on various research projects—including deductive reasoning in children and adults, circadian variations in human performance, and adult language comprehension—but has always maintained a research interest in children’s reading comprehension, particularly individual differences. Dr. Oakhill has published widely on children’s reading comprehension. In 1991 she received the British Psychological Society’s Spearman Medal; she was elected to a Fellowship of the Society in 2005.